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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22489039">From heaven they sent</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fielding/pseuds/Estelle'>Estelle (Fielding)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>B99 Season 7 Countdown Project [31]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Episode: s03e08 Ava, Gen, Godfather Jake, Missing Scene</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-01-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-01-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 15:02:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,028</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22489039</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fielding/pseuds/Estelle</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“You want to hold her?”</i>
</p>
<p>Jake holds his goddaughter for the first time. Takes place during Ava.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>B99 Season 7 Countdown Project [31]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1588849</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>61</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>From heaven they sent</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Story No. 31 of my Season 7 Countdown Project. THE END!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p>
<p>It’s only as Terry is bent over the bassinet, hand sliding under his daughter’s delicate head, cupping the warm weight of it in his palm and thinking again how precious this life is, how fragile, that it hits him: Jake has never done this before.</p>
<p>(Truthfully, he doesn’t know that for sure, but he’s almost certain.)</p>
<p>Terry eases his other hand under Ava’s tiny body and lifts her to his chest, awed all over again by her perfection – the curve of her nose, the curl of her miniature eyelashes, the plump jut of her cheeks, which are already flushed a rosy pink. She is asleep and for a moment he’s lost in her, memorizing her face and the five wrinkled fingers that have slipped out of the swaddle. His heart is so full of love his chest aches with it, in the best possible way.</p>
<p>He’s blinking back tears when he finally turns to Jake.</p>
<p>“Have you held a baby this small before?” he says, making no move to pass over his girl right away.</p>
<p>Jake is swaying a little, pushing from one foot to the other with nervous restlessness, and Terry can see the muscles tensing across his shoulders. But his eyes are fixed on Ava, and there’s a softness there and in the small smile playing at his mouth, and the look on his face isn’t fear, it’s wonder. </p>
<p>Jake shakes his head and then breaks his gaze and glances at Terry. “Are you sure you want me to-”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Terry says, and adjusts his daughter, cradling her head as he holds her out toward Jake. “Bend your arm, a little more- yes, just like that.”</p>
<p>And then he’s setting Ava’s head in the crook of Jake’s elbow, and he guides her body into Jake’s arms; she’s so small, not much more than a bundle of pink blanket against Jake’s gray hoodie. Terry adjusts Jake’s position, moves his arms until he’s sure Jake’s got a good hold. He lays a palm over the crown of his baby’s head and strokes his thumb over the smallest frown that’s formed on her brow, and he takes a step back and leaves Ava alone in her godfather’s arms.</p>
<p>Jake’s eyes are bright as he gazes down at her. Terry can’t imagine what thoughts are flashing through Jake’s weird and exceptional mind (he isn’t sure he wants to know), but the love that Jake already has for this child is obvious – he’s practically got hearts in his eyes – and not surprising.</p>
<p>Terry chose Jake as godfather in large part because he asked. The two most obvious godparent choices – Sharon’s best girl friends from college – had gone to Cagney and Lacey. Terry has plenty of non-work friends, but none of them expressed any interest in being a godparent before, nor have they been especially active in the twins’ lives since. The fact that Jake had campaigned for the job had earned him points with both Terry and Sharon. In the end, when Terry had asked Sharon about it, she’d shrugged and said sure, and then, “Isn’t he the one who gives you acid reflux?”</p>
<p>Initially, Terry had thought it might be a joke, or possibly a prize – something for Jake to lord over Amy or Charles (or basically the whole squad). But Jake quickly had made it clear he was serious, and then Terry had thought: Jake is brave and smart and confident, and he has such a good heart. And Jake laughs. He laughs more than anyone Terry knows. And didn’t Terry want that for his daughter? To be as fiery and fierce as her sisters and her mother, and as full of laughter as her godfather?</p>
<p>Even after he’d said yes, Terry mulled it over some more, and later he realized that Jake loves the same way he does his job: with reckless abandon, with all of his strength and his passion, with his arms and his heart wide open. He screws up sometimes, but he doesn’t hold back. He will give his godchild everything that’s in his power to offer.</p>
<p>Eventually, Terry’s doubts disappeared entirely.</p>
<p>Terry sits beside his wife on her bed and carefully drapes an arm around her shoulders, and she settles into his side, and it doesn’t matter one bit that they’re in a hospital, that almost everything went so horribly wrong today, because the important things went right and Ava is here and she is healthy. And Jake is responsible for a lot of that. Their baby is so lucky to have him.</p>
<p>Jake shifts his arms, and it’s barely a twitch, but Ava’s eyes open. Terry knows she can’t really see anything just yet but he’d swear they are making eye contact, that they are locked on to one another just now. Jake grins at her and Terry can feel his unbound joy like a presence in the room, like something electric.</p>
<p>“Hi,” Jake says, voice so soft and gentle it’s almost unrecognizable. “I’m Jake. I’m your godfather. We’re going to have so much fun together. And if your parents die, I’m going to take reasonably good care of you.”</p>
<p>“Terry?” Sharon says. She reaches for him and her grip on his forearm is painful.</p>
<p>“Uh, Jake-” Terry says, rising from the bed.</p>
<p>“Look, ‘reasonable’ is the best I can guarantee, and I’m not going to make promises I can’t keep. That would be a terrible way to start godfathering,” Jake says to them both. He looks back at the baby, blinks at her and beams when she blinks back. “Isn’t that right, godbaby?”</p>
<p>Terry means to respond to that – and he knows Sharon is a half-second from asking Terry how the hell Jake got the idea that he would ever be Ava’s guardian – but then the baby <em> hiccups </em>and every sour emotion in the room dissipates like it was never there, and everyone is smiling and crying and overcome again with how right and perfect the world is.</p>
<p>“That was the cutest fucking sound I’ve ever heard,” Jake says.</p>
<p>Terry kisses his baby’s forehead and then he kisses Jake’s forehead because he just can’t help himself, and he says, “Amen, my god-wife.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>*Title is from Bikini Babe Workout (Bash Brothers).</p>
<p>*Weirdly, this was the first story I wrote for this project. But it seemed appropriate to end the countdown with Jake holding his baby goddaughter for the first time. Here’s to season 7!!</p>
<p>(*I’m going to be super obnoxious now and thank a bunch of people for their help or support or flailing or whatever with this countdown project.)</p>
<p>*First thank you: Oh my god, Fezzle. My beta and my dear friend. I WOULD NOT have attempted this dumb project without her. She beta’d 31 STORIES (That’s more than 30K words! In a month!) and she saved my ass more than once. She also helped me brainstorm ideas and she talked me off the ledge a few times. I cannot capture how completely amazing she is and how much I love her. Everyone should be so lucky to have a Fezzle in their lives (especially if they’re going to attempt something ridiculous like this series, but also just, in general).</p>
<p>*Second thank you: Everyone who gave me a fic prompt! Some of the best ideas came from you guys. I’m going to name folks here and hope I don’t forget anyone or get a name wrong: Fezzle, Madeofzits, Andrewsambags, Explodingsnapple, Theoneintheblue, Vickovac, Weshallmeetagain, Ofbuttsandbombs, Amyscascadingtabs, and Feeisamarshmallow. (That’s in the order stories were posted btw.) If you sent me a prompt and I didn’t write it, please tell me! I may have missed you somehow. I’m also super open to prompts at any time, so don’t hesitate to hit me up after this month (I’m @vernonfielding on tumblr).</p>
<p>*Third thank you: EVERYONE who left kudos or comments or likes, or who reblogged on tumblr or reached out to me personally in some way. I LOVE YOU ALL. Writing fic can sometimes feel weirdly lonely and isolating and it is always so great to get any kind of feedback. (Let’s be honest, feedback is like a fucking drug and it is the best.)</p>
<p>*Fourth thank you: I really especially appreciated the folks who engaged in some great fandom discussion with me relating to these stories – in particular, Amyscascadingtabs and Feeisamarshmallow and Explodingsnapple (timeline!) and Mediumsizedevil. That was fun, guys.</p>
<p>*Fifth thank you: Anyone who read all of these stories, even if you never feedbacked. Fedback? Anyway, you’re out there and I appreciate you too!</p>
<p>*Sixth thank you: Fezzle again, just because. ❤️</p></blockquote></div></div>
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